Cruise ship heads to port following storm
MIAMI — A Royal Caribbean cruise ship ran into high winds and rough seas in the Atlantic Ocean on Sunday, forcing frightened passengers into their cabins overnight as their belongings flew about, waves rose as high as 30 feet, and winds howled outside. The cruise line says that although no one was injured and the ship suffered only minor damage, it’s turning around and sailing back to its home port in New Jersey.
“I was shaking all over,” Shara Strand of New York City wrote to The Associated Press via Facebook on Monday. “Panic attack, things like that … I’ve been on over 20 cruises, I’ve been through a hurricane, it was never like this. Never.”
Sixteen-year-old Gabriella Lairson says she and her father, Sam, could feel the ship Anthem of the Seas begin to sway by 2:30 p.m. Sunday. The captain directed passengers to their cabins. There, the Lairsons heard glasses shatter in the bathroom, and they put their belongings in drawers and closets to prevent them from flying across the room. They ventured to the balcony, where Sam Lairson shot video of wave after wave rising below.
“The winds were so strong that I thought the phone would blow from my hands,” Sam Lairson, of Ocean City, New Jersey, said in an email. “After that we had to keep the doors to the balconies sealed.”
The ship — with more than 4,500 guests and 1,600 crew members — sailed Saturday from Cape Liberty, N.J. It was scheduled to arrive for a stop at Port Canaveral, Fla., at noon Monday, then move on to other stops in the Caribbean. But Royal Caribbean said on its corporate Twitter account the ship would turn around and sail back to Cape Liberty. “This decision was made for guests’ comfort due to weather forecasts” that would continue to affect the ship’s itinerary, Royal Caribbean tweeted. Guests will get a full refund and a certificate toward a future cruise — passengers buzzed happily about that news onboard, Strand said.
Sen. Bill Nelson has called for the National Transportation Safety Board to investigate.
“The thing about this storm was that it was forecast for days. So why in the world would a cruise ship with thousands of passengers go sailing right into it?” Nelson said on the Senate floor on Monday, according to a news release from his office.
The National Weather Service’s Ocean Prediction Center had issued an alert for a strong storm four days in advance, said Susan Buchanan with the weather service. The first warning was issued Saturday for possible hurricane-force winds in the area the ship was scheduled to sail through.